A site tracing the Catholic life and history of the Ancient Kingdom of Gwent, now known as Monmouthshire,UK from Silurian times. Linked to Mary in Monmouth download free from iTunes Store or RSS feed at end of this blog.Also MaryinMonmouth Group of Face book. Photographs of interesting places. Some Catechesis.Strength of site is in tracing obscure Gwentian saints and martyrs and digging out gems from forgotten sites.Some photographs by Chris Tottle are copyright. Sites in Welsh Marches.

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ST DAVID's CANONISATION 1120AD

WALES WIDE PILGRIMAGE IN 2020 to celebrate a thousand years since his canonisation!-using old pilgrim routes!!!

Come to the Waters....

Whoever drinks the water I will give him will never thirst, indeed the water I give him, will become in him a spring of water, welling up to Eternal Life....John 4:14

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Ancient Cwmbran and the Cistercians

St Derfel, Patron Saint of Cwmbran

Followers

St Michael as a Centaur, fighting on the side of Peter and the Church

Liam Neeson played this int he film

PODCAST IMMINENT OF THE VISIT OF THE RELICS TO CARDIFF

I took recordings of the various Masses and liturgies in the Church as the relics were being received in Cardiff on Tueday and have only lightly edited them. I was doubly glad so many people, who were not able to get in and hear the service of reception and so forth will have the possibility of listening to the Masses for Priests and Vocations, Evangelisation, and personal sanctity, Angelus, Rosary , Litany and Benediction. It was extremely crowded, but I think it captures all the excitement of that day when thousands descended on Cardiff, clapped the little saint for her Christian witness and brought her candles, red roses and many other flowers, incense and beautiful music at the evening Mass.People streamed in until the Cathedral closed at Midnight, and devotions continued all evening, with people praying for conversion of sinners, confessions, praying for priests and praying that all would accept Jesus as their personal friend and Saviour. A Mediaeval style day none will forget. And Bravo to the superb organist!

Dominicans Today buiding a new Friary in US

Procession of Friars

PODCASTS RESUMING SOON AFTER COMPUTER PROBLEMS

I am resuming podcasting later this week or next, because I hade two computer crashes and have had little time to find all the things I need to resume it. I apologise to all the fans of the podcast and all the emails.You can download them from the rss address on this blog, or even via iTunes. Many people like listening on long car journeys! There are some interesting topics coming up.So keep posted.

Dominican Friars

At Chapter

SANCTUS ILTUTUS

St Illtyd , the great Educator

St Ia sculpted by Oberammergau Sculptor

In the Catholic Church. St Ives

Spring in St Ives

The time in Bredon is

Listen free Online to the new podcast!My Pilgrimage to St Winifride's Well

Title Page of the Idylls of the King

Looking for a Quiet Peaceful holiday in a beautiful area of France?

Directions to Capel y FFin

Main road from Abergavenny to Hereford, (or Hereford to Abergavenny if coming the other way!!)Turn off to Llanvihangel Crucorney. Pass Skirrid Inn.Turn LEFT to Llanthony Priory and stay on that road, past priory and up the mountain until you come to Capel y Ffin. Turn Left to monastery, but monastery is in private hands and so you must ask permission to view. On pilgrimage days parking in designated field kindness of Mr and MRs Watkins.

St Illtyd at Gorslas, Camarthen

The Ancient Yew Tree of Mamhilad

DO YOU KNOW WHY BISHOPS WEAR POINTY HATS CALLED MITRES?

Because they represent the flames which came upon the Apostles when Jesus met them to give them these gifts and the organisation of his Church. There was a great Wind and flames of fire, and we are told they settled on the Heads of the Apostles. When the Apostles appointed their successors, the Bishops they received this headwear to remind them they are the descendents of the Apostles of Christ himself, who founded his church on the rock of Peter.

Link to Mary in Monmouth Blog at Libsyn and Show notes

Early British Kingdoms and Saints .

Benedictine Abbey of Bec in Normandy

Monks from here built the Priory of St Mary Magdalene in Goldcliff. The local church is still dedicated to this saint. The Church was built there after the Tsunami of 1607 which destroyed what was left of the Priory.

Truth about Relics

Relics have often been a stumbling block for people trying to understand the church. It is no different than keeping a special photo, item or clothing etc from a loved one when they have passed on. Kissing a picture or reverencing it, lighting a candle next to it or putting a poppy by it on remembrance day, just brings them alive again to you, shows them honour and respect. In the case of relics, if you can ask a living person to pray for you, then we can ask the souls who have made it to heaven to pray for us too, Having a small item which has actually touched their body or even a part of that body brings them especially close to them. The Holy Spirit has completely infused their body, So you ask this person to add their prayers to yours up above, and sometimes there are miracles as a result, although it is the prayer to Almighty God that works the miracle if there is to be one and it is his Will.

Apostles and Martyrs

Bernadette and Our Lady

Our Lady of Lourdes in Tredegar!

Saint Tewdrig /King Theoderick

An Internet bereavement Commemoration

Head of Our Lady from a fresco in the Gunter House, Abergavenny

Secret Masses were said here in times of Persecution 17th century

Hello! The first ten pictures

The first ten pictures are from Llandaff Cathedral or Abbey Church of Our Lady and St Teilo, Then there are some from Mathern Church. Please download the Internet podcast Mary in Monmouth to hear the programmes at maryinmonmouth free from iTunes. This programme is FREE as well. So just type the title Maryinmonmouth into the Store Window and you will find it then subscribe! Automatic after that!Big pictures and feeds and links are at the VERY BOTTOM of the blog! Sorry! Mary

About Me

Evelyn Nicholson is a professional singer who has sung with all the major opera companies as principal soprano.Evelyn has begun her blog influenced by her father's love of the ancient Kingdom of Gwent and to foster a defence of misconceptions about the Catholic Faith.She is a qualified catechist of the Catholic Faith.

2.O Father, bless our dear ones, away across the sea
Across expanse of waters they call and hope inThee
Away from their country, their captains at their head
O comfort those who mourn for the Living and the Dead
O Jesus be their Sacrifice, their hope and refuge be
The Father, Son and Spirit, the Blessed Trinity.

3.So for Peace among the nations, we pray with one accord
That love may over-come all the hatred of the sword.
We pray for Love in action, our inspiration be
O remember those defenders ,who died across the sea
Lead us Father into Freedom , remember those who died
In the faith of our Salvation, of Christ the Crucified.

4. And there's another country, I've heard of long ago
Most dear to them that love her, most great to them that know
We may not count her armies, we may not see her King
But her fortress is a faithful heart, her pride is suffering
And soul by soul and silently, her shining bonds increase
And her ways are ways of gentleness, and all her paths are peace.

Monday, November 1, 2010

The Reverend Jennifer Mole showed me round the small but pretty Church of Llanfihangel Pontymoile this week. The second part of its name-the Bridge of Moile is easy to see, a llan is awhat it always was a Cambro- British Monastery and ‘Mihangel’ the name of the beloved and fierce defender of the Lord, St Michael. This was not its original name which was Cilgoegan. So who was this lost saint, who was despatched upon the arrival of the more powerful St Michael, which did not happen until Tudor times, after Henry VIII dispute with Rome and the founding and reorganising of his own church

St Michael was a popular dedication in Monmouthshire and often associated with mountains. J Darrell Evans , who wrote the guide book for the church writes' there were so many dedications for this defender of the heavenly hosts in this unstable borderland, they were each given another name to distinguish them'. The nearest village was Pontymoile, more than a mile away, and this name predominated by the seventeenth century.

It was all part of the manor of Cilgoegan, stretched between Cae Brest, the river and the Clarewaun brook and part of the lordship of Usk.

In the ‘Taxatio’ of Pope Nicholas in 1254 it appeared the church of Kilgoigen in his inventory of the churches in England and Wales. When the churches were taken by the king, in the sixteenth century they referred to Kylegoygane annexed to the parish of Panteg. This always seems to have been a small chapel and quite poor. Both Panteg (originally Llandeverguir? Given in the sixth century to St Cybi by the petty king Edlogan after the famous miracle) and Llanmyhangel are given in the charters as belonging for nearly five hundred years to the Priory of St Mary at Usk. Interestingly, neither church appears as having any assets at all in Henry VIII officials of additions of the land and possessions, including trusts and offerings made by the faithful which he took for himself.

The parish name seems to have appeared as Llanfihangel Pontymoile on the first published map of Monmouthshire by Christopher Saxon in 1577.By this time ‘llan’ had come to mean church, but it was not exactly this, as we know it was an early British monastary, and as its name suggests, this was perhaps originally a hermitage. (‘Cil’ is Welsh for Latin ‘Cella’ or cell-a hermit’s cell)so St Coegen may have originally been a hermit. However, extensive searches have not revealed such a saint, so Coegan may have simply been humble hermit, living in this little chapel in the grove. There is no doubt that the church was rebuilt in stone after the conquest and served the Christians living around it at a time when most people lived on the land and worked it. Yet the plague perhaps (1315-1317) caused many such small agrarian communities to be wiped out, and the churches attached to them never recovered their former numbers. This seems always to have been a small chapel in a grove, andthough dedicated to St Michael, it seems likely that the British term CEUGANTsuggested the dwelling, the realm of the Druid God, and may have been kept by the Christian hermit living there. Druidic lore was always an oral traditions, whose rites were not even written down until the seventeenth century. In the absence of any important founder, the cell of this hermitage probably existed on the site of an olderand deserted Druid grove and the name stuck for some time. In thePriory at Usk ,it was simply called Llanmyhangel-obviously the name it was known by from its take over by the Benedictine nuns.

There is also a possible link to Coygan(!) from ceredigion, who was a leader at a hill fort there and it is always possible that this grove was the place where he spent lent away from the world in penance as so many of the saints of this period did. In the absence of any firm sources, however, this is speculation as I can find no other references and this practice of Lenten retreat was common at the time.

The rood loft was removed from the church after the Reformation, which would have contained a picture of the Doom and the great Crucifix, under which the Faithful would come to confess their sins to the priest sitting there in persona Christi.Nowadays if you approach the pulpit through the Vestry , there is a narrow door through which the person preaching has to approach. This was the door which originally led to the rood loft.

On the south wall of the Church is a very old memorial stone tablet (pictured above) with an inscription in 18th century lettering. ‘Here lieth ye body of Thomas Iones of Glascoed who departed this life in the 14th Day of September. Ano Dom 1713 .Aged 41 years’.

The Wakinshaw Windows are of later date and depict the Holy family in one panel and Christ reading the Scriptures(!) in the other. Walkinshaw funded the Free Press of MMonmouthshire newspaper and the windows are probably to remind people of the fact he was a newspaper man. There is another beautiful window in memory of his son Alexander James, who died at only nine years of age- something beautiful for what must have been a terrible family tragedy.
.The ceilings show much wear and tear and flaking plaster which is a shame. It is a very small country church with only `11 regular churchgoers who cannot afford the repairs. The churchhas put out an appeal for help for the £8,000 it will take to deal with the roof and stop it collapsing.

It is a Norman style barrel roof with small; gold rose bosses.the present ceiling comes from the eighteenth century. The whole structure remained intact when in 1924 the church roof slipped off, the crash giving rise to the rumour that an earthquake had happened.

Thefts and an appeal for the twenty first century.

Sadly the church has to be kept locked because of the large number of artefacts which have been stolen. The vicar tells me lead has recently been stolen from the roof of Panteg Church as well and this little church of Heaven, needs £8,000 to repair the ancient roof with only 11 older parishioners. It is a Grade II listed building. There are only 420 people living in the parish.

Prayers please,especially at this time. If this amount can be raised, there is a possibility it can be matched.

The Church in Wales website has details of this little church at Pontymoile which is attached to the Church at Panteg if you can help.